Twelve South's $39.99 AirFly Drive makes wired CarPlay wireless, and Sonnet ships a Thunderbolt 5 10GbE adapterTwelve South's $39.99 AirFly Drive makes wired CarPlay wireless, and Sonnet ships a Thunderbolt 5 10GbE adapter

Twelve South has released the AirFly Drive, a $39.99 adapter that turns a car's wired CarPlay into wireless CarPlay.

It went on sale on 1 October from Twelve South and Amazon in black and white, and in Europe at around 50 euros, according to Heise. The adapter plugs into the car's USB data port, the one wired CarPlay already uses, and the iPhone then connects to it without a cable. It measures 22.5 by 22.5 by 27 millimetres and weighs 42 grams, with a USB-A plug and a USB-C adapter in the box.

Which cars and phones work with AirFly Drive?

Any car with factory wired CarPlay or Android Auto, according to Twelve South's product page, which lists iOS 10 or later and Android 11 or later. Twelve South's own page says vehicles from 2016 onward; 9to5Mac reported compatibility back to 2014 and Heise said about 50 makes from 2016, so the manufacturer's figure is used here. MacRumors described it as a CarPlay adapter only, but Twelve South, 9to5Mac and Heise all confirm Android Auto. It does not work in cars with only an AUX input or a charging-only USB port.

It pairs with two phones and switches between them with one press, reconnects when the car starts, and needs no app or account. The car's touchscreen and steering-wheel controls work as before. Twelve South gives a two-year warranty.

Sonnet's Solo10G T5 for Mac and iPad Pro

Sonnet's Solo10G T5, announced in late September and covered by AppleInsider on 1 October, adds a 10Gb Ethernet port over Thunderbolt 5 for $199.99. It also runs at 5, 2.5 and 1Gb, draws 7.5 watts from the computer so it needs no power supply, and has no fan. Sonnet says it works with every Apple silicon Mac and M-series iPad Pro without a driver, as well as Thunderbolt 3, 4 and USB4 hosts. AppleInsider lists macOS 15 or later; Sonnet's page gives no minimum. It has no pass-through port.

Our take

Wireless CarPlay adapters are not new, and the AirFly Drive's case is its size and its price from a brand that has made Apple accessories for years. The cars it serves, with wired CarPlay from the late 2010s, are exactly the ones still on the road and not getting software updates. That matters more as CarPlay grows: Apple's parked-only video apps in iOS 27 CarPlay are one example of a feature that arrives through the phone, not the car.

APPDOOK's caution is the one that applies to every adapter of this kind: wireless CarPlay drains the phone, and without the cable there is no charging. On a long drive, a charging pad or a second cable is still part of the setup.

Sonnet's adapter is aimed at a much smaller group, people moving large video or photo libraries to network storage. For them the bus power is the real change: 10Gb Ethernet that runs from a MacBook Pro or iPad Pro without another plug makes fast networking portable in a way earlier Thunderbolt adapters were not.